U.S. Supreme Court postpones oral arguments through April 1

In ordinary times, I, like other religious liberty observers, would be gearing up for two important cases scheduled for Supreme Court argument in the coming weeks. Tanzin v. Tanvir, which was scheduled to be heard on Wednesday, March 24, and Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrissey-Berru, which was slated for oral argument on Thursday, April 1, could have implications for church-state issues (follow the links for more background on each).

But these are not ordinary times, as you well know.  The U.S. Supreme Court has postponed oral arguments out of public health concerns for the first time since the 1918 Spanish flu outbreak.

If you haven’t already, please read the note on these challenging times from BJC Executive Director Amanda Tyler. Here is a snippet:

While the day-in, day-out work of our mission may seem less urgent as we face a global public health crisis, the heart of our mission remains vital. Ensuring that every person has the freedom to believe and to act on those beliefs without unnecessary government interference is core to a flourishing human existence.

 

You can be confident that we are pressing on and continuing with the important work of standing up for our shared values and supporting faith freedom for all. I hope you will stay connected during this time, whether that be reading new articles, listening to podcast episodes, using our resources or videos to share your passion for this work with your social media networks, or advocating for faith freedom for all.

The new BJC podcast series, Respecting Religion is a great place to start. In this week’s episode, they discuss the Our Lady of Guadalupe case, which involves the ministerial exception.

And come back to BJConline.org regularly for news updates from across the religious liberty landscape.  You can follow me on Twitter for religious liberty headlines: @BJCBlog.